It's Our Product, But We Have Nothing To Do With Its Sale

Disastrous distance here:

The chief executive of Lap-Band maker Allergan Inc. said he doesn't support an independently run Southern California billboard marketing campaign that promotes the weight-loss surgery with slogans such as: "Diets fail! The Lap-Band works!"

"That isn't the wording I would use. We put patients' welfare and safety at the top, so I wouldn't support it," David E.I. Pyott said in an interview Wednesday.

The Irvine company does not fund the 1-800-GET-THIN ads that were created by a marketing company that directs prospective patients to clinics that perform the weight-loss procedure using Allergan's device. The Lap-Band is a silicone ring that's surgically fitted over part of the stomach to discourage overeating.

...His remarks came as the Food and Drug Administration considers Allergan's request to allow the surgery on less-obese patients, a decision that would add millions more Americans to the pool of potential customers.

...Three Southern California patients have died after Lap-Band procedures, according to family members and autopsy reports in Los Angeles and Riverside counties.